If as has been widely reported the USMC Force Recon company was taking a turn as the in-theater QRF, then there are orders out the wazoo sending them to Sigonella, assuming they started in Germany. I don’t know where or when they were located before Sig on 9-11. But there are orders from the theater commanders such as Ham getting them to the “launch point” you damn betcha.
But they couldn’t cross Libyan air space without an explicit, official execute order, including explicit CBA.
Now that, we shall find no record of, because it was never given. Instead, Obama went to bed to rest up for Las Vegas, (while Ambassador Stevens was missing and possibley about to get the Nick Berg close shave on video.)
1. SHTF.
2. The alarm goes out. Once it does, command centers in Germany that control our ops in Africa and Europe lock in in real time, and execute standing orders to get assets into position to pour water on the SHingTF.
3. That done, and I'm assuming that the time it takes to get that done is < the 7-8 hours the battle lasted, the assets are in place, waiting for someone to push the Go button.
4. The Go button is never pushed because given the geopolitics involved (crossing into a sovereign nation's territory with fighting in mind), the only one with authority to push it . . . doesn't.
Is that basically what we're talking about here?